Bead Bloggers

Good Sunday Morning to you! Hopefully you've got your coffee in hand and your sitting down at the computer to do a little surfing. Here are some blogging beaders with loads of projects and inspiration for you to enjoy. Have a wonderful day,
Jennifer


About.com Jewelry Making Learn to "make it yours" from this latest issue of Make It Mine magazine. You'll find lots of crafty goodness including some fun jewelry articles, one even from our very own bead buddy, Candie Cooper!

Art Bead Scene Is it time to get organized? Art Bead Scene has storage ideas to help you get organized.

Jennifer Jangles Blog Jennifer shows two bright and fabulous projects featured in Simply Beads this month.

Jewelry & Beading Glass bead curtains?? Come and see Denise Perreault's sun-catching masterpieces!

Katie's Beading Blog Bead embroidery doesn't have to be hard! Check out Katie's embellished felt flower. It's just right for spring!

Naughty Secretary Club Win a free copy of the spring issue of Make It Mine Magazine that includes painting projects by Jen’s younger sister Hope Perkins!

Savvy Crafter It's a plane! No! It' a Felty Bird just in time to hang out on your spring jacket.

Snap out of it , Jean! There's beading to be done! I had such a good time with Naomi Fujimoto that I wanted to repost our story of our trip to NYC!

The Impatient Blogger Ornament Thursday returns with the theme of Sprout. Madge dips into her new stash of vintage French postcards to make a charming little collaged pendant with metal mesh accents.

Ornament Thursday, Sprout

The theme is sprout and this is not a sprout. But it is a cute little spring birdy that I made for someone as a special order. I made several and they turned out so cute that I kept a few for myself. The word sprout makes me think of spring. Birds, flowers, trees, grass.... they are all sprouting this time of year.

This necklace has a few flowers and leaves along with my new little birdy. I used some muted colors that I thought were appropriate spring colors. I know...I said muted, but hey, for me there muted. The brown beads are pressed Czech glass, then there are pearls and faceted Czech rounds.

Check out the list of artists below and see what "sprouted" out of their heads this month.....

Ornament Thursday Artists


Alexa Westerfield - a.k.a. Swelldesigner
Now that's it's time for spring, ideas are "sprouting" all over the place. Alexa creates this eye-catching notebook to keep them in order.

Art Bead Scene
Some good karma is sprouting up at the Art Bead Scene with Heather's Lotus Flower Bracelet

Cindy Gimbrone
The Brooklyn National Anthem sprouts every year when Cindy's in Spring mode. See what it inspired this year!

Earthenwood Studio Chronicles
Melanie giggles and remembers a furry friend, brings back an old mold, and sprouts up a beaded LOLhammy ceramic ornament.

Helen Bradley and Michelle Zimmerman at http design
It's spring and we're sprouting all sorts of wonderful art at http design. Michelle is toting her art to the market and Helen revisits a fun art school assignment for her inspiration.

Humblebeads
Humblebeads celebrates spring with a Berry Good bracelet inspired by some juicy disk beads.

Jennifer Heynen of Jangles
Jennifer has come up with a cute little necklace to remind you of spring.

Katie's Beading Blog
Create some spring flair of your own with this easy bead embroidery idea from Katie's book, Hip to Bead.

Kriss Cramer - Spring Is In The Air
Not much of a horticulturist? Me neither! But I love flowers and I enjoy growing these ones with some paper, paint, and rhinestones.

Linda Augsburg at Make It Mine magazine
Tea decided to join the fun this month. Check out her quilt blocks and Linda's purse.

Melissa J. Lee - Strands of Beads
What do Korean playing cards have to do with a sprouting spring? Check out Melissa's blog to find out.

Michelle McGee - S-P-R-O-U-T
Michelle just can't stop creating in green! A little wooden birdhouse becomes a beautiful palace!

Savvy Crafter
Candie shares some happy spring memories with a cheerful felty flower idea!

Snap out of it, Jean! There's beading to be done!
Jean tells a touching, poignant tale of some beads who help one another, and after a small amount of sturm and drang they get it together and help each other! In fact, they prettify whatever YOU choose! Go see! It's fun!

Spring is Sprouting for Joolz by Lisa
Even without a green thumb, Lisa managed to "grow" a garden of sorts this month.

Sprouting Up with Beading Help Web
Lynn Kvigne's used wire and a lentil bead to create a "sprouting" pendant for wire workers who want a bit of a challenge!

The Goddess ROCKS!
Inspired by a river rock shaped like an ancient goddess statue, Hali paints, melts crayons and adds glitter to create a sparkley celebration of Spring.

The Impatient Blogger
How does your garden grow? With metal mesh, Czech glass beads and vintage French images all in a row! Margot just returned from Paris where she discovered a treasure trove of vintage paper. This scanned and sized postcard image fit the theme of sprout perfectly and the necklace was in search of a new home...add some teal metal mesh bows and accents and voila...a design sprouts forth!

Vintage Girl Teams Up With Her Vintage Momma!
What does a gal do when she finds herself far from her crafting supplies? Why, she raids her mom's basement and then puts dear old mama to work! Stop by and you'll see why mom's basement is fertile ground for things that sprout!

Simply Beads Projects

(© Simply Beads 2008, used by permission)

Hello everyone in blog land...... hope you're having a good day. I wanted to mention that I have two, great for spring and summer, projects in the April issue of Simply Beads. You should check them out. The first is a charm bracelet made with a sterling silver charm bracelet and my ceramic discs. It makes noise when you wear it. You could say it Jangles. Ha! Ha!

My second project in the issue is called the swag necklace. I guess that name came from when I was a floral designer, long ago. Swags are the things that are like wreathes you hang over the door. This necklace kind of has an upside down swag made with seed beads. I used my bead cones, original beads, and bead mixes to finish off the necklace.

Both necklaces are in the magazine with full instructions. If you haven't picked up an issue of Simply Beads lately, you should. It's got some really great projects.

Cheers,
Jennifer

Heynen Hula Hut

My husband, Nik and I have been working very hard on the Heynen Hula Hut. This is what we call our back porch bar. When we moved into our house a year ago, we had a four post structure just off to the side of the back porch. It screamed to us that it needed to be a tiki bar. We have been working on it for the past year. It is functional but still needs things. This week it was stools. We had these regular wood stools that bought at Target. Nik sanded off the varnish on the tops and I went to town painting them. We then coated them with a polyurethane and put them to use. It's much more fun to sit on these than the plain wood versions. I love the look of the concentric circles so I can guarantee over the next few weeks you will be seeing some news beads done in this fashion. I will post pictures when I finish them.

I'm So Honored

I can't believe it. I was asked to join the Bead Bloggers group. This is a group of amazing women who all bead, write books, write articles, and everything else that has to do with beads and jewelry making. Margot Potter nominated me to be a member, and some other great designers like Jean Yates and Melanie Brooks Lukacs chimed in and said yes, let's have her. Woo hoo! So from here on out on Saturday mornings, I will be posting links to some great projects and announcements from these Bead Bloggers. Here's today's list.

Have a great weekend!

About.com Jewelry Making
Tammy has discovered another outlet to sell your jewelry on-line. This is really a place for other crafters too.

Art Bead Scene
What's the best suggestion you ever received? ABS Editor Cindy Gimbrone's was The Rainbow Suggestion. ABS readers weigh in and tell us theirs!

Jewelry & Beading
Cyndi details the products and methods she likes best for creating her bead-embroidered necklaces.

Katie's Beading Blog
Here's another opportunity to use your beady powers for good. Read Katie's blog to find out about Beads of Courage®.

PearlEsq.
Robin's got some great news, tips and samples on everything Memory Glass!

Savvy Crafter
The Savvy Crafter is in the Philippines this week. Candie's Travel Tip: Look beyond the everyday souvenir and you will find beads!

Snap out of it, Jean! There's beading to be done!
Jean hand made a chain maille double standed bracelet with some very special names on it: her two grandsons! It is offered as a free project in Beading Daily online!

The Impatient Beader
Ever wonder how a designer comes up with new ideas? Get a peek inside the creative mind of Margot Potter as she shares two bitchin' and bad ass new designs. Paging Biker Crafts Magazine!

Ah.....Memories

So it was just Birkley's Birthday and I am reminded every year when it comes around of how my life changed when he was born. You know, I have an older son, so I was already a mother and not sleeping. Motherhood was a huge change in my life, but I am talking beads here. This is a blog about beads, you know. Here is my story.....

From a few posts back you know that I used to make tiles and mosaics. So fast forward five years into making tiles and glass bead making was becoming really popular. I had always felt that glass was my calling, even though I had never tried it. I just had a feeling. Cindy Jenkins had just written Making Glass Beads and was selling a kit to go with the book. I got it for my birthday and started right away. I loved it but the beads weren't that great. So one night sitting at the torch it came to me that I should be making ceramic beads. At the time, I was unaware of the "Bead World", as I like to call it. So I didn't realize there were other people out there making them like Mealnie Brooks Lukacs or Joan Miller. I came up with some beads and started making jewelry. I went to the Chicago giftmart with my jewelry and sold them there. After a year and a half of making my jewelry I was expecting and couldn't go to the giftmart. I wouldn't be able to fill orders with a new baby. I needed something to do while I was at home with the two little ones. I had heard of this show called Bead and Button and it was in my back yard, I thought I would give it a try. Bead and Button was only in it's second year so I really had no idea what I was getting into. Birk was born and six weeks later, I was at my first bead show. I did great and the beads took off from there. Every year I am reminded when Birk turns another year older that Bead and Button is right around the corner. I can't believe this is going to be my fifth year at the show. Boy time flies. It also reminds me that I need to get to work making beads for the show!

Birthday Boy

My little guy turned five last week. Here's a picture of the castle cake we made. Now as soon as we finished decorating it, I took this photo. As soon as I got the photo snapped he added his people. Because castles have to have people right? He has quite the collection of Disney characters, Ninja turtles, Fairies, Power Rangers, and Super heroes. They all live together in his big wooden castle and for his birthday, they lived on his cake.

Check this out

Margot Potter a.k.a. The Impatient Beader made this fabulous necklace with my beads in it. It's really great, I have never thought of designing with Lucite and my beads but wow it works perfectly! If you have never checked out her blog, now is the time to do it. Margot has me laughing everyday when I read it.

Welcome to My Online Bead Show

Hi there,
This weekend is the Bead Bonanza in Southfield, Michigan. I used to always go to the show, but since our move to Georgia last year it's just too long of a drive. Therefore, I am having an online bead show. What is that you ask? I am not really sure either but the two reasons why I go to bead shows is for the inspiration and not having to pay shipping. I am going to try my best to help. First, I will be posting jewelry ideas for inspiration on my blog all weekend long. I have included seven on this post. Second, I am going to offer free shipping to everyone who mentions they read my blog or my newsletter. If you didn't get my newsletter you should, there was a brand new project sent out today with instructions. Send me an e-mail at jennifer@jangles.net to sign up or click here. Free shipping runs until midnight this Sunday the 9th. Go to the Jangles website.

It's here, well my copy is....

EEEEK, Squeal, Wohoooooo, Yahooooo, Yipeeeee.....
It's here. I got my copy of my first book ever! It was such a surprise to open my door to find what the UPS man had left me. I am sure somewhere in all of the book writing Lark told me I would be geting an early copy of my book but I totally forgot. What a surprise. Take a look, I know you have seen the cover before, but check out the back. You can see several of the projects that are in the book. Ceramic Bead Jewelry comes out officially on June 3rd.

A Blast from the Past

I was cleaning up my studio the other day and I found a few photos. These are from the second art fair that I ever did. I was twenty three, just out of college. I had quit my job as a corporate floral designer and needed to come up with something to do. I have my BFA in ceramics and was making some tile tables for fun. People kept telling me I needed to sell them. I signed up for a few art fairs that summer and thought I would try it out. My first show was in Chicago and I did alright. This picture is from my second show in Royal Oak Michigan. I sold out in the first hour. I had to sit there the rest of the weekend with nothing. On one hand I was very excited and on the other hand, I was kicking myself for not making more. That summer is what started my careeer as a self employed artist. I have been in business for 11 years. I started making beads six years ago, but that's a story for another day.